Both of you should read this book, which pulls historical information on the
medical value of cannabis into one highly readable source:
Grinspoon, Lester, M.D. MARIJUANA RECONSIDERED. 1st edition Cambridge:
Harvard University Press, 1971, rpt 1977. Updated paper edition Oakland:
Quick American Archives, 1996.
Dr. Grinspoon is part of the faculty at Harvard University Medical School
and was the Dean of the Medical School in the 1970s. He has been conducting
direct research on marijuana since 1967. Six of his books address the
history of the practice of medicine in America, including this book in
particular. His account, rich in detail, charts the reliance of mainstream
medicine on cannabis well into the 1930s. It's illegalization had NOTHING to
do with any harm that it did; on the contrary, physicians were almost
uniformly furious to have it taken away from them. It was made illegal for
purely political reasons, to criminalize the behavior of certain
"undesirables" so that they could be arrested and put away.
The 1930s was the period of the Great Depression, when for the first
time, the Americans suffering in poverty and starvation from economic
conditions caused by Big Business began to organize politically, to speak
out, to start people's independent newspapers, etc. This was regarded by the
Republican administration under Hoover, who owed their rule to the big banks
and the Rockefeller-Morgan-Rothchild syndicate as the greatest of outrages.
Stalin and his communists could not have been more feared and hated than was
the fact that hungry out-of-work Americans dared to organize and to urge
their fellows to join them.
However, the American legal system was "hampered" by a serious problem
that made the danger worse (from the administration's viewpoint). America
has this inconvenient little thing called a "First Amendment" that gives all
citizens the right to speak out freely without danger of police state
suppression. How oh how to get around it? Now, there were many differences,
apart from the wealth-poverty divide, that separated the fearful rich from
the mouthy, obstreperous poor. The biggest one was their culture. This was
also the highpoint of the jazz age, with both white and black poor people
rallying together to start their own gathering spots, pool halls, and music
venues that played their own music. Well before any national integration
laws, people of all colors mingled freely in these venues. It was the first
alternative culture in our country. And the black element of it, which
preferred marijuana to alcohol, introduced it into white channels through
their social and political associations.
This was the hook the administration grabbed. The mainstream drug of
choice was alcohol. Therefore, if they could criminalize marijuana, used by
their targets, they would now have an excuse to arrest them, incarcerate,
and silence them. It was the perfect way to get around the First Amendment
and shut up earnest political opponents in the burgeoning people's movement.
Much of what Dr. Grinspoon points out, curiously, I knew already. My
late father was 45 when I was born. He was born in 1907 and had graduated
from Emory Medical School and started his medical practice in 1930. For 8
years, like every other physician he prescribed cannabis widely---the
official preparation in the U.S. Pharmacopeia was called "tincture of
hemp"--as the treatment most effective against epilepsy, asthma (it's STILL
the most effective treatment by far of any anti-asthmatic and will stop an
attack in its tracks in seconds), hypertension, and morbid pain (infinitely
safer than opiates), with no side effects other than sedation and a
pleasantly altered mood. It is non-addictive and there have been no
legitimate medical diagnoses of marijuana "addiction" ever. No-one has died
of it; massive overdose in tests makes both animals and human volunteers
sleep for days but then they wake up with no harm. Just yesterday at the
Shadow convention here in Los Angeles a speaker read from the FDA's own
statistics citing 90,000 inadvertent deaths in 1999 ALONE from PRESCRIPTION
DRUGS. So where should the actual "safety worries" realistically be
focused?
Returning to my Dad. His use of cannabis in his practice mirrors that of
the physicians Dr. Grinspoon describes in his book. Then, in 1937, the
Congress began to debate the Volstead Act which would remove it from the
pharmacopeia. As the FDA does today, the then governmental medical
"authorities" began using their easy access to the press to disseminate
public scare information, trying to deter the "law abiding" public from ever
trying it so that the undesirable political elements would be the only ones
caught in this new "criminal" dragnet. As did other doctors, my Dad wrote
his own letters of testimonial to his representatives, to no avail. He and
my mother were living in Virginia at the time and reading D.C. papers--the
papers widely announced that the public had been "silent" on this issue.
When I was young during the sixties, therefore, my father was understandably
less than impressed by the lurid drug scares so widely disseminated through
the media; in fact, it was the B.S. published about marijuana by the
mainstream 60s press that prompted him to relate this history to me.
It's all politics, today and yesterday. Marijuana competes with
prescription drugs. It's illegality allows dissident voices to be arrested
on flimsy pretexts. It also allows the legal pirates in the government drug
war to enrich themselves by confiscating the property of all those involved
in its cultivation or sale. (What would the government Mafia do, poor
things, without the War on Drugs to make an honest living for themselves?)
I'm going to shut up now. Just do read this book, because it will put the
historical facts and sources in your hands. Knowledge is power.
Jenny Decker
----- Original Message -----
From: "Aleisha Saba" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Thursday, August 17, 2000 7:20 AM
Subject: Re: [CTRL] I have to ask this
> You made me really wonder here, involuntary - about use of medical
> marijuana and what it really does. Feds say no medicinal value? Maybe
> that is true; but, nicotine is a drug used in medicines, but forget what
> for.
>
> What you said made me wonder......some people go through chemotherapy
> and feel pretty good; others become very, very ill and are given
> medication now with the therapy.
>
> What if marijuana just relaxes people - for it is said stress can really
> cause cancer victims unheard of problems.....
>
> Know two women who went to chemothrapy daily....each continued to work
> daily - while others had really adverse reactions.....
>
> What if marijuana relaxes a person, relieves the stress, creates a sense
> of well being, and at no cost if you can grow it free......but one there
> was a patent pending on first marijuana cigarette - was aware of this in
> 1972 but never checked it out, for had no reason.
>
> So.....Zoloft - a drug to improve serotonin to do with neuro
> transmitters....supposedly eat a banana or potatoes have same effect.
>
> I really wonder about this because going through some of the treatments
> for cancer - this is a traumatic experience and stressful.
>
> What if marijuana just releases the stress which reduces some of the
> side effects?
>
> The man who died recently who could not smoke marijuana - how horrible -
> his life was made a living hell, and something that could have given him
> an easier path to follow was denied.
>
> So guess marijuana is illegal because like butterflies, it can be free
> in your own back yard.
>
> Am still stashing up on the catnip and maybe I make a catnip cigarette
> and find some marijuana and give it a try.
>
> After all, the police some of whom I accidently caught years ago,
> smuggled cigarettes up from Kentucky and had no tax stamps - and booze
> which was poured into real labeled bottles.....when I saw that one
> checking this famous basement for all was not well at our
> banquet.....there they were.......funnels and all.
>
> Upstairs was the Treasurer of Ohio and the candidates to many different
> office........did I snitch - with all those cops in on the game?
>
> No way..........
>
> Saba
>
> Some things one does not do = matter of family pride.
>
> A. Saba
> Dare To Call It Conspiracy
>
> <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A>
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screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please! These are
sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'—with its many half-truths, mis-
directions and outright frauds—is used politically by different groups with
major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought.
That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and
always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no
credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply.
Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector.
========================================================================
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